Passions Pursued

At adult camps, YOU put the icing on the cake, rake in the chips, learn to jam and even throw a wicked left hook.

From Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine, March 2006

Poker Camp:
You're Gonna Know When to Fold 'Em

The woman across the table bears a striking resemblance to my sainted third-grade teacher, Mrs. Maloney. Even here on the floor of the Mirage casino, in the middle of a poker tournament with a very nice grand prize, I am flooded with warm feelings.

But now this Mrs. Maloney doppelgänger has just pushed a small mountain of chips to the middle of the table and declared, "All in." For players of no-limit Texas hold 'em -- we are both at a poker camp devoted to the game -- that's the equivalent of Remember the Alamo, Death Before Dishonor and Banzai rolled into one. I push my stack of chips in and watch as she confidently flips over a pair of queens. I slowly roll over my two cards -- aces -- and see her smile evaporate like a snowflake in hot soup. Oh yeah, baby. Pocket rockets. Read 'em and weep. "All in" THIS.

What a rush.

On the plane to Las Vegas, I read this nugget about no-limit Texas hold 'em: "No beginner should even consider playing it. It is not a friendly game." Maybe not, but that bit of advice was published in 1997. Now the game has become a national obsession, infesting cable channels, college dorm rooms and probably old-folks homes.

The game is awash in beginners, and most have discovered the hard way that no-limit Texas hold 'em "is a one-way love affair," says fellow camper Carlota Gonzalez. So we don't fall into the ranks of "marks" and "patsies," 60 of us have anted up $1,500 to learn the intricacies of the game from professional players.

And if you've never played -- or never played well -- you'd be surprised just how intricate a game it is. No-limit Texas hold 'em is to five-card draw as chess is to checkers. Your betting position on the table is a factor. The different reasons to bet, the amount to bet and the odds -- not the chances of just making your hand, but those odds versus "pot odds" -- are other factors. Add to that getting a read on your opponents based on everything from betting patterns to eyelid twitches.

Of course, intimidation plays a big role. I learn this from poker pro Cycalona "Clonie" Gowen after she deals a practice hand. When the betting comes to me, I check my cards and look up to find myself fixed in Gowen's unblinking stare. She is pretty, fine-boned and 110 pounds soaking wet, but in that instant chills creep up my spine and I feel like a chipmunk in a hawk's cross hairs.

The two-day camp is an excellent and practical way to learn poker. You sit at poker tables in a conference room, so after lectures on strategy you can play a couple of hands and immediately internalize what you've learned. Also, clips from World Poker Tour events (the camp is owned by former corporate-training executive Ron Rubens, who runs the camp as a licensee of the WPT) are played both to demonstrate key points and to engage in "what if" scenarios.

The campers come from all walks of life, but are mainly white-collar types who play regularly. Gonzalez is a personality on Las Vegas hard-rock station KOMP 92.3. I meet engineers, systems experts and two doctors. Every fellow camper I ask says the $1,500 tuition is worth every chip.

The camp tournament's winner is Jim Caplan, a Los Angeles doctor. For besting the rest of us, he receives a seat in a World Poker Tour satellite tournament, worth at least $1,000. The WPT camp, Caplan says, gave his game structure and foundation. "Now I am playing much more methodically."

Caplan uses his newfound skills to knock his girlfriend, Fay Gauthier, out of the tournament. As Gauthier recounts how his flush beat her pocket tens, I notice the look in Caplan's eyes. It's part adoration for her, and part Oh yeah, baby. Ace-high flush. Read 'em and weep.

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